


Left Behind

by toushindai (WallofIllusion)



Category: Baccano!
Genre: F/F, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-26
Updated: 2016-02-26
Packaged: 2018-05-23 06:49:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 916
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6108496
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WallofIllusion/pseuds/toushindai
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>No time to grieve their lost love.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Left Behind

The door to Carla's room was open. Carla was bent over her desk, not facing the door, writing something. At least, Victor assumed she was writing something; but after a few moments she remained motionless, and he didn’t hear the scratch of pen against paper. He ventured around in front of her and found that she was staring at nothing, a blotch of black ink slowly spreading from the pen tip across her half-written report.

“Carla…?” Victor said quietly, not wanting to startle her. There was no answer. Victor considered his options for a moment; he would have given anyone else in this kind of stupor a good shake, but that was a bad idea with Carla. Cautiously, he waved his hand in her line of sight instead.

That did the trick. Carla returned to herself with a quiet gasp, her posture straightening out though it had hardly been slumped to begin with. She glanced down at her ruined papers and swore under her breath before depositing the pen in the inkwell and looking up at Victor at last.

“Mr. Talbot. Can I help you?”

He looked back at her with a wry half-grin that was probably the wrong expression to be making. “I was just wondering how you’re holding up,” he said. Frankly, he hardly needed to ask: though her bearing was impeccable as always, not a hair or thread misplaced, her eyes were bloodshot and kept sliding slightly out of focus. She was tired—the kind of tired where your body starts shutting down whether you give it permission to or not. She was in pain.

Nevertheless she answered as though he’d simply asked for a progress report. “We’ve captured a few more townspeople who might be Mask Makers, but the alchemists have all fled. The citizens and the soldiers alike are on edge. I had to stop one of the knights from burning down the Third Library today—…?” She put a hand to her head, thinking. “No, I think it was yesterday. It’s morning, isn’t it?” 

“Yeah, it’s about ten.” 

“Yesterday, then.” 

In the process of dodging his question, she’d answered it. “You haven’t slept?” 

“I’m fine,” she said, her eyes still not focusing properly. She shook her head and pulled out a new sheet of paper. “I’m sorry, Mr. Talbot, but I am very busy. I need to write to—to the House Dormentaire and report on the situation, they must be kept up to date, and then I need to accompany the soldiers on another raid to make sure they conduct themselves properly, so if you have no further business—”

“I haven’t been sleeping, myself,” Victor confessed suddenly. She shut her eyes and turned her face away, but he continued. “Not properly, not through the night. I get in bed and I _try_ , dammit, I try not to remember lying next to her but it’s like my brain’s stuck. I keep thinking of what she’s like afterward, you know? When she’s sweet and sleepy and you can tell that for a few minutes all she’s thinking about is how much she loves you, and—just—it doesn’t make any fucking _sense_ that anyone would kill someone like that—”

“Mr. Talbot, _please_!” Carla stood abruptly, her red-rimmed eyes intent and bright. “I need my focus. What matters now is finding the ones responsible for the explosions. The House Dormentaire will have their revenge, but we need to find the criminal first.”

“What you need is to _rest_.” 

Her lips trembled, then pinched together with indignation. “With all due respect, I don’t take orders from you, Mr. Talbot.”

“It’s not an or—goddammit. Carla.” Victor ran his hand through his hair. “I’m _worried_  about you, alright?”

“I don’t need your worry.” 

“Well, _maybe_ I don’t give a shit whether you need it or not! All I know is that _I_ feel fucking awful, and I know you cared about her so I’m guessing you feel the same way, and I just want you to know that someone sees that, alright? You don’t have to be alone in it. I don’t know, maybe that makes things worse for you, maybe you wanna keep it all bottled up inside and hidden in which case I’m sorry, I’ll leave, but I just—I just… I don’t know.” He lost his steam and felt himself flush with embarrassment and frustration. “I should leave. Sorry.” 

Carla sank back into her chair. “Yes, you should leave,” she agreed, impassive.

“Yeah.”

He stalked back around her, feeling sicker than he had before he’d entered. Alright, so he’d stuck his nose where it didn’t belong again. Nothing new there. Hopefully he hadn’t made things worse, but knowing himself, he probably had, right?

He had his hand on the doorknob when Carla spoke one last time.

“Mr. Talbot…”

He turned. She was still facing away, but her voice was quiet and controlled. 

“There is no need to apologize for what you said.” 

For a moment, he stared at the back of her head. Then he gave a grim smile. “Listen, Carla,” he said, his voice low. “I swear, when we catch whatever bastard did this, no matter what the Dormentaires do to ‘em, I’ll personally make sure they regret it for the rest of their lives.”

She gave something that might’ve been a laugh. And, as he opened the door to leave her to her privacy, he heard her mutter, half to herself: 

“You’ll have to get to them before I do.” 

**Author's Note:**

> Lucrezia's an asshole.


End file.
